Riza in Wonderland
by NorwegianSpiritNinja
Summary: A spin-off on Lewis Carroll's story, Alice in Wonderland. After a long day at work, Riza finds herself trying to escape a bizarre dreamland. Warning: OOCness may occur.
1. Welcome to Wonderland!

"Lieutenant Hawkeye, are you almost done with that paperwork? It's getting pretty late, and everyone else has gone home. If you want to leave now, I think Colonel Mustang would let you finish tomorrow," Kain Fuery said anxiously.

Riza Hawkeye smiled at him.

"It's okay, Fuery," she told him. "You go on ahead. Don't worry about me."

"A-are you sure Lieutenant?"

"Positive," Riza said. "Besides, my apartment isn't far from here. You should head back to the dorms, though. You know they don't let you in after eleven."

"Okay then, Lieutenant Hawkeye," Fuery said, turning to leave. "Do you want me to drop by your place and feed Black Hayate?"

Riza allowed herself another smile as she thought of the black and white puppy she had acquired the year before.

"No, I can take care of him when I get home. I shouldn't be too much longer," she told her myopic colleague.

"Well, I guess I'll see you tomorrow then, Lieutenant."

"You, too, Fuery."

Riza sighed as she heard the door click shut behind her. She had been working all day on the mountain of paperwork that her lazy, good-for-nothing superior, Colonel Roy Mustang had dumped on her. It was his fault for procrastinating on his paperwork. He was the one that should be doing this, not her. Riza wished she could go home as Fuery had suggested, but she knew that she had to fulfill her duty to the military first. She picked up another report and skimmed through the content, eyes glazed over with exhaustion. The farther she read, the more she noticed how the letters seemed to be swimming across the page. Riza felt her eyelids droop as she became more and more lethargic. Maybe it would clear things up if she just put her head down for a while. It wasn't like she was going to sleep. She just needed a little cat nap…

"Arf! Arf!"

Riza started as she heard a dog barking. She glanced at the clock, her eyes widening. Had she really slept that long?

"Arf! Arf!"

There was that dog again. It sounded like it was inside the office. That was absurd though. Pets weren't allowed in the office, and a dog couldn't have possibly wandered in through the closed door or the windows. Riza jumped as she felt something nudge her leg. She stared down in shock.

"B-Black Hayate?"

The puppy looked up at her expectantly, tail wagging a mile a minute. Riza blinked before reaching down to grab it.

"What are you doing here?" she asked. "Come on, let's go home."

Even before she had her hands around Black Hayate, the puppy had evaded her fingers and dashed out the door, which was standing ajar. Riza jumped up.

"Hey! Wait!" she called, dashing after her dog.

Black Hayate led Riza out the main doors of the Central Command Center and down several streets. He glanced back to make sure Riza was still following before jumping down an uncovered manhole. Riza's eyes widened in shock.

"No!"

She skidded to a halt beside the manhole and peered inside, afraid of what she might see. All she saw, however, was darkness. She thought that she might be able to see the outline of something moving below, but she wasn't certain. A shrill little voice reminiscent of a dog's barking reached her ears from down below.

"Riza, hurry up! We're going to be late!"

Riza started and lost her balance.

"Wait! What? Who—?" She was cut off by her own scream as she felt herself pitch headfirst into the black abyss. The air whipped around her face, making her dizzy and disoriented. She fancied that she heard voices, but from which direction she did not know. Riza felt herself losing consciousness as her body entered a state of shock. Right as she blacked out she heard her name called as though many were whispering in unison.

"Riza…"

Riza opened her eyes and found herself staring up at what seemed to be an endless tunnel. Gingerly, she sat up, checking for injuries. She found none. In fact, she wasn't even sore. Riza frowned.

"That's odd," she thought. "I should be dead considering how far I fell."

She gazed to her left where a wooden table stood in the center of the circular room she had landed in. At the foot of the table was a little package. Curiously, she crawled over to inspect it.

The package, once opened, revealed a small cake, the words "Eat me" scrawled across the top in icing. Riza shook her head in disgust. Why on earth would she do something like that? It was clearly a trap.

As Riza stood up, she noticed that a crystal bottle sitting primly on top of the table. The bottle contained a clear liquid and was itself made of a transparent crystal, which had been cut so that its facets caused it to cast iridescent prisms on the surface of the table. It was completely unmarked and unidentified except for a small tag attached to the stopper which read, "Drink me."

A wry laugh escaped Riza's lips. As if she would drink something that was so obviously dangerous! She wondered what sort of moron would actually consume the most-likely-poisonous solution. And the cake, too! Seriously, what sort of idiot did these people take her for? Her gaze dropped from the bottle to the table's surface, on which there rested a small brass key. She picked it up, new strength flooding through her.

"That's right," she thought. "I have to get out of here and rescue Black Hayate. Then I have to give Roy Mustang a beating for dumping so much work on me. If I hadn't been at the office for so long, none of this would have happened!" She began scanning the walls feverishly. The fact that there was a key meant that there was a door somewhere, and that door would inevitably lead her to an exit. It wasn't long before Riza found the door. She stared at it in bewilderment. The door was a foot high. No human being, even Edward Elric, was short enough to fit through there! Even if Riza crouched down she couldn't squeeze through. However, this was obviously the way she had to go. This was proven by the fact that the key she had picked up was able to unlock the door easily.

Lying on her stomach, Riza could see what appeared to be a bright forest filled with mushrooms on the other side. This puzzled her as much as the door. What was a sunny forest doing underground? Nothing seemed to add up. Riza was determined to get through, though. It was the only exit available to her, as she couldn't very well climb back up the tunnel.

Riza felt the wall around the door. Good, it wasn't too hard. She should be able to get through that. Riza slammed her foot above the door. The wall was promptly smashed, providing Riza with a reasonably sized opening to crawl through. Squinting through the dust and debris she found that she was indeed in a giant-mushroom-filled forest (giant in this case meaning a foot and a half high). Pulling her gun out of her holster, Riza cautiously made her way through the strange land.

She hadn't been travelling for long before she saw smoke rising from one of the mushrooms. Holding the revolver out in front of her Riza approached it. The smoke, Riza was surprised to find, was cigarette smoke, coming from a cigarette which was being smoked by a thoughtful-looking blue caterpillar. Riza carefully aimed the gun at the caterpillar.

"Tell me where I am," she demanded. "Now."

The caterpillar calmly looked into the barrel of Riza's revolver before shifting its glance to her face. It took a long drag from its cigarette before commenting, "You're a pretty one. You doing anything this evening?"

Riza lowered her revolver, startled. Was a caterpillar seriously hitting on her? Either way, it clearly was not as sagacious as it appeared.

"I don't think that's the tone to take with someone who's holding a gun to your head," Riza replied sharply. "Now tell me the way out so I can find Roy Mustang and beat him for getting me into this mess in the first place!"

The caterpillar merely stared at her before saying, "You're rather large, aren't you? I'd have thought you would have shrunk after you drank the contents of that bottle back there." Here he motioned toward the room from which Riza had come. Riza snorted.

"Like I would drink something that was so obviously poisoned! If you really want to know, I smashed the wall down."

The caterpillar blinked up at her in surprise, losing its cool for a moment.

"Smashed the wall down?" it repeated.

"Yes, smashed the wall down," Riza said impatiently. "Now could you please tell me how to get out of here?"

The caterpillar gave her a stern glare.

"You're not going anywhere until you're shrunk down to size."

"Well, for your information," Riza said, beginning to get very frustrated indeed, "I will not be shrunk down to size." She pointed the gun at the caterpillar again. "Now tell me where to go!"

The caterpillar eyed the gun nervously now. Finally, in an attempt to regain its composure, it cleared its throat and said in a quiet voice, "Okay, come down here so I can tell you."

Riza replaced her revolver in its holster before leaning down next to the mushroom so that her face was very close to the caterpillar.

"That's more like it. Now wher—umph?!" As Riza opened her mouth to speak, the caterpillar unceremoniously shoved a piece of the mushroom it was sitting on down Riza's throat. Riza spluttered, coughing on the unexpected piece of mushroom.

"Why, you son of a—!" Riza felt she was being squeezed in a vice. Her eyes widened in panic as she fought for air. She felt relief wash over her as the sensation became moribund. The relief soon left her, however, as she realized that she was only six inches tall.

"What the—?!"

The caterpillar gave her an approving smile.

"That's much better, Riza. Now I suggest you find the Hatter. He might know what to do."

"How do you know my name?" Riza asked suspiciously.

"Why, we've been expecting you, of course," the caterpillar replied, raising a yellow mark that could pass as an eyebrow. It blew more smoke out of its mouth. As the smoke wrapped around it, obscuring it from view, Riza called, "Wait! It's only fair that I know your name if you know mine. Who are you?"

From inside the opaque cloud, Riza heard the caterpillar reply, "Jean." When the smoke had cleared, the caterpillar had disappeared.

Riza decided that she had better take Jean's advice and find the Hatter that he had mentioned, although she had no idea what she was looking for. She found a path amongst all of the mushrooms and started walking. Perhaps she would find someone that could point her in the right direction. As Riza continued down the path, she noticed that the mushrooms were replaced by actual trees. It was also getting darker. As she walked deeper into the forest, a black cat walked out onto the path. It paused, and the two of them stared at each other. Riza was more of a dog person than a cat person, but maybe this cat was lost. She hadn't seen anything to indicate it wasn't. Obviously, she couldn't bring it home with her because of Black Hayate, but she could help it find its owner right?

"Are you just gonna sit there all day?" the cat asked in a bored tone.

Riza gaped at it. First a mushroom forest with a smoking caterpillar, now a talking cat? What was with this place?

The cat rolled its eyes. "Of course, I shouldn't expect intelligent conversation from a mere human." It grinned suddenly before transforming into a teenager with long black hair that was styled in a way that was reminiscent of a palm tree and an ouroboros tattoo on its thigh. Riza couldn't tell whether it was male or female.

"So," it said, striking an arrogant posture, "you're Riza Hawkeye, right?"

"How do you know that?" Riza demanded. "And don't say that you've been expecting me. The caterpillar, Jean, said that, too, and it didn't make any sense." She reached for her gun.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," the guy (Riza decided to just call it a guy) said, noticing where Riza's hand was going. "As to how I know who you are," he continued, "I can't give you any better explanation than the caterpillar did." He sighed. "But I bet the caterpillar also told you to find the Hatter, didn't he?"

Riza narrowed her eyes and frowned at the guy. She was beginning to think that he knew even more than he was letting on.

"I knew it!" He grinned. "You humans are so easy to read. I can't believe you even try to keep secrets, especially from a superior being such as myself."

"So you're saying you're not human?" Riza asked.

"Eh? Of course I'm not! It's really insulting you had to ask, you know! I mean," he said, arrogantly flipping a strand of hair over his shoulder, "could a mere human do this?"

Riza watched in horrified fascination as he changed his appearance once again, this time so that he resembled Riza herself.

"S-stop that," Riza stammered as she whipped her gun out of its holster, training it on her double that stood in front of her.

"What?" the other Riza sneered. "Don't like seeing yourself outside of the mirror? What are you gonna do, shoot? That would seem awfully like suicide, wouldn't it? You humans are so easily to manipulate!" he/she/it crowed. "I doubt you could even—ouch!"

The real Riza fired her revolver, sending a bullet into her double's head. The figure before her fell to the ground. Riza's breath came in shallow gasps. It had been very hard to pull the trigger against someone who looked so much like herself. Coupled with the sense of déjà vu that accompanied watching the transformations, the whole experience was beyond creepy; it was downright disturbing.

"What was that for, huh?" The figure, now back to its black-haired teenager form, stood up, brushing itself off. Riza stared at it. The wound in its head was completely healed. It glared at Riza, who had come to the decision that it wasn't really anything that could be described by gender and would, therefore, be described as 'it.' Riza kept her gun pointed at it.

"Don't come any closer. I won't hesitate to shoot again if you do," she warned. The thing in front of her rolled its eyes.

"Humans," it said with a derisive snort. "You're all simple-minded fools." It jumped forward and grabbed Riza's hand that held the gun, forcing the cold steel against its own head.

"Go on," it jeered. "Shoot. You've seen what good it does." It tapped its forehead. "Bullets can't kill me, remember?"

"What are you?" Riza whispered. Staring at the spot where she had shot it.

"I'm a prototype homunculus, which is far more powerful than a lowly human. I guess you could say I was the result of an experiment. Not anything you'd be dabbling in, of course." It leaned closer to whisper in Riza's ear. "And I suggest you put down the gun before I lose my temper."

Slowly, with trembling hands, Riza lowered the revolver. The creature smirked.

"Good girl. That's more like it," it cooed. Riza stared past it with dead eyes, unable to move.

"I think I'll reward you for coming to an intelligent decision," it continued. "You don't _really_ deserve to know, but I'm feeling generous, so I'll tell you how to get to the Hatter's place."

"You don't seem to be the type to do something out of the kindness of your heart," Riza said dryly, finally finding her voice again. The creature shrugged.

"Maybe that's because I literally don't have a heart," it suggested lightly. Riza didn't say anything. She was beginning to think that nothing would surprise her anymore.

"Okay," the creature admitted. "I lied about feeling generous. I actually have orders to let you live. You're an important pawn in this game whether you know it or not. Besides, I have an ally who would love to watch this story play out. Wouldn't want to disappoint such a good supporter, now would I?

"Anyways," it continued. "Follow the road for a quarter of a mile. There'll be a path to your right that leads to the Hatter's." It started to walk off, leaving Riza in the middle of the path.

"By the way," it said, turning to grin at Riza. "The madness around the Hatter's place seems to be ubiquitous. Be sure to go crazy, okay? I like watching you filthy creatures running around like fools." With that it turned and disappeared into the shadows of the forest.


	2. The Mad Tea Party

**Well, I'm finally jumping on bandwagon and posting an Alice in Wonderland spinoff. For those of you who do not read my profile, the overly academic sounding words are the result of this story being written for my English class. Please forgive me for not updating often (I'm waiting for my next assignment to do more) and for any OOCness that has occurred/might occur (I don't know the characters in FMA as well as some in other fandoms). And last but not least, please enjoy!  
**

* * *

Riza couldn't help but feel that she had been led the wrong way. She wished she could have asked someone besides the creepy homunculus for directions, but, as she hadn't run into anyone else, she had no choice but to follow its directions. She had found the side path easily enough, but she had been walking down it for almost twenty minutes without seeing any signs of civilization. Heck, forget civilization! She hadn't even seen any animals, talking or otherwise.

Sighing, Riza sat down on a tree stump to contemplate her decisions. She could retrace her steps and see if she could find Jean the caterpillar again. He might be able to tell her whether or not she was going the right way. Riza shook her head. Jean had literally disappeared. He wasn't likely to return anytime soon. Besides, going back meant risking another encounter with the homunculus. Riza shuddered. Their last encounter had been particularly unpleasant, and she wasn't keen on reliving it.

Suddenly, a giant blast of energy engulfed the tree to Riza's right, swallowing it and leaving no trace, save the roots. Riza leapt to her feet. There was a long trench created by the energy as it had travelled. Riza cautiously made her way along the trench, which ran parallel to the path she had been on, revolver aimed in front of her. Whatever was out there was clearly dangerous. It wasn't long before she reached another road running perpendicular to her path. Right in front of the old path was a large brick wall. On the wall there sat a large creature that looked vaguely human with a turgid stomach. As Riza approached, the creature cocked its head to the side, looking at her.

"Who are you?" it asked.

"My name is Riza Hawkeye," Riza replied. Its voice was soft, almost childlike, and Riza might have found it almost cute if she hadn't noticed the ouroboros tattoo on its tongue. She groaned inwardly. This thing was probably another homunculus. Said thing looked at Riza disappointedly.

"That's sad. I wanted to eat you, but now I can't. Lust told me not to." Riza's eyes widened in alarm.

"You mean there are even _more_ of you?"

"What do you mean 'even more'?" it asked. "Of course there are more like me. Like Lust. Lust is like me."

"Who is this Lust?" Riza asked. "You've mentioned it several times."

The creature swelled indignantly.

"Lust is not an 'it'!" it cried. "She's the most beautiful queen in the world, and she takes good care of me!"

"This place has a government?" Riza inquired.

"Oh, yes!" the creature replied happily. "We have a king and a queen. Wrath is the king, and Lust is the queen. I really want to go see her now." It looked thoughtful. Riza took the opportunity to inquire further.

"So, where does Lust live?" she asked.

"She lives at the castle," the creature told her. "It's really big and beautiful, and it's that way." It pointed down the road to the right.

"Thanks," Riza said, turning and walking in the opposite direction.

"Wait!" the creature called after her. "You're going the wrong way! Take me with you! I want to go see Lust, too!" It tried to jump off the wall but ended up falling over backward. Because of how rotund it was, it was unable to get back up.

"No!" it yelled. "Wait for me!" When it found Riza unresponsive, it began flailing around on the ground wailing, "Not fair! I can't get up! Lust! Help me! Lust!"

Riza ignored it as it flailed around. If it was anything like the other homunculus, it would kill her as soon as the order not to was relinquished. She imagined that Lust and Wrath wouldn't be that fond of her either.

"Besides," Riza thought. "I have yet to find this Hatter that everyone is talking about, and I'm assuming that someone so mad wouldn't be at the castle."

Riza was pleased when she discovered that her assumption had been correct. She was standing in front of a large decrepit house in front of which was a long table with each place set for tea. The table's occupants, however, only consisted of three men, one wearing a maroon tailcoat and matching top hat, another wearing a moth-eaten vest and, Riza noted with dismay, rabbit ears. The third was a large muscular man who appeared to be sleeping at the table. Riza began to doubt not only the sanity of the group in front of her, but also her own when she noticed that the large man was wearing mouse ears on top of his bald head. What was with these guys?!

As Riza watched, the man in the top hat drained his teacup, looked around at the other two, and then shouted as loud as he could, "CLEAN CUP! MOVE DOWN!" The rabbit eared man whacked the mouse eared one with what looked to be a stack of photographs. The mouse eared man drowsily opened his eyes to see the rabbit eared man gesturing urgently to his right. The whole party shifted down a spot at the table.

Riza decided that now was as good a time to assert herself as any and cleared her throat.

"Um, excuse me? Could whichever one of you three is the Hatter please tell me if you've seen a dog come through recently, and if so how to get him and go home?"

The man in the top hat looked up when the name Hatter was mentioned, and, seeing Riza, promptly jumped up and ran across the table toward her. Landing in front of her, he grabbed her hand and shook it vigorously.

"You must be the Lieutenant!" he cried ecstatically. "You can call me Hatter. Everyone around here does. We're all so glad you're here. But first, before you have any questions, I'd like to give you a riddle." He raised a gloved hand and snapped his fingers. A tree behind Riza promptly burst into flames.

"Tell me," Hatter began, "how am I like fire?"

Riza stared at him blankly. What did this have to do with anything? Hatter grinned, clearly wanting to give the punch line.

"Fire and I are both hot!" he declared, striking a pose, clearly pleased with himself.

Riza's gaze never wavered.

"You keep deluding yourself, sir," she told Hatter.

"'Sir'?" Hatter asked. "Does this mean you acknowledge me as your superior?"

Riza frowned. She wasn't sure why she had called him sir. All she knew was that there was a strange sense of familiarity about the man in front of her. She dismissed it almost immediately. That was ridiculous. She had never even been to this place before. There was no way she knew him.

"Anyway," Hatter was saying, "I'm glad you brought that up. You see my friends here and I are planning…" He looked around suspiciously to see if anyone was listening, before leaning close to Riza and whispering in her ear, "We're planning to stage a _coup_."

"You're planning a coup d'état?" Riza asked. "To overthrow Wrath and Lust?"

Hatter yelped as if he'd been burned (no pun intended).

"Not so loud!" he whispered. Louder he said, "Boy, Queen Lust and King Wrath sure are great! I would _never_ want them to be overthrown by insane revolutionaries!" He turned to Riza again and whispered, "This will get them off our scent if they were listening."

"Daddy has taught his darling little Elicia to love the King and Queen! So, Daddy would never plot against them or try to stage a coup d'état!" the rabbit eared man piped up from the table. He kissed one of the photographs he was holding. "Ah! Elicia is so adorable!"

The mouse eared man opened an eye before getting up and ripping off his shirt.

"This loyalty to the King and Queen has been passed down through the Armstrong family through generations!" he boomed. "We have never wavered in our loyalty. The strength that runs through these veins comes from…" He began rambling about his family history. Hatter regarded him with mild interest.

"He's unusually talkative," Hatter observed. "Usually he's much more laconic." He turned to his companions.

"Come on! Let's sing the national anthem!"

The other two gave a cheer before starting to sing, "Oh, say can you see, Oh, Canada, God save the Queen, like a tea tray in the sky, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle…"

Riza's eye twitched as she watched her new obstreperous acquaintances. These guys belonged in an asylum for sure. Suddenly, the sound of many horses galloping through the forest interrupted the party. Hatter shrieked and threw his hands into the air.

"It's the knights!" he cried, eyes widening in fear. Immediately he and his companions began scrambling around frantically. Hatter stopped for a moment as he remembered Riza.

"Hide Lieutenant Hawkeye!" he yelled. At that moment, however, the several men on horseback burst out of the woods, quickly surrounding the party. Several of the knights quickly ran over to the party to restrain Hatter and his friends.

"Don't move!" one of them shouted. "You are under arrest for plotting treason against the King and Queen."

"W-what?" Hatter said with a nervous laugh, fear flickering in his black eyes as one knight removed his gloves. "We would never do such a thing! We love the King and Queen. Now would you give me back my gloves please? That was completely unnecessary. Come on guys," he said looking desperately to the Hare and Dormouse. "Let's sing the national anthem! Such an occasion surely merits—"

"Now, now, Hatter, you know as well as I do that you're lying. So why don't you drop the act and shut up? And as for your gloves, we all know that you use them to make your flames, so no, you will not be getting them back. We wouldn't want things to be any more complicated than they have to be."

A man clad in a white suit and fedora had just walked out from behind the ranks of soldiers. From the looks of it, he was their commander. The man smirked at Hatter, whose eyes widened in fury.

"Kimblee!" Hatter yelled. "You perfidious ba—" Riza covered Hatter's mouth for the sake of the reader before turning to the other man.

"Who are you?"

The man smiled at her.

"Well, this is a pleasant surprise, Lieutenant Hawkeye," he said in a rather unctuous tone. "I didn't think I'd run into you here. Although, I suppose this makes my job easier." He tipped his hat to her. "Solf J. Kimblee at your service. If you would come with me please, this whole ordeal would be much less…messy." To demonstrate his point, he clapped his hands together, which promptly resulted in one of Hatter's teapots exploding in an impressive display of hot tea and shattered china. "I can do that to organic matter, too," Kimblee warned her.

Riza frowned at him. Kimblee was obviously not someone to underestimate. He also seemed to be from the castle, which meant he worked with the homunculi. But Hatter had called him perfidious, which indicated that Hatter and Kimblee had once been allies.

"Why would I want to trust you if you've already betrayed Hatter?" Riza asked. "And what job are you talking about?"

Kimblee chuckled.

"You are a sharp one, putting things together so quickly like that," he said. "My job is to take you to the Queen, and I'll tell you why you want to come with me." A twisted smile crossed his face. "You want to come with me because you value dear Hatter's life, which ends as soon as I feel like clapping my hands together. Of course, I won't create such a bloody mess if you cooperate. I do hope you choose to. It would be a shame to stain my clothes with Hatter's blood."

Riza stared at him in horror. This man was obviously a psychopath. What was worse was that he worked for the enemy. Riza looked at Hatter, who had fallen completely silent. His face had been drained of color, leaving his skin an ashen gray. As much as Riza disliked Hatter at the moment, she couldn't have him killed. According to everyone she had met so far, Hatter was the one who could get her home.

"Alright," Riza said. "I'll go to the castle."

Kimblee smiled.

"Good," he said. "I knew you would see reason." He smiled at Hatter. "You'll be coming with us, too. We wouldn't want Riza trying anything foolish." With that, Kimblee turned on his heel and began walking down the road.

"Lieutenant," he called to Riza. "I would hurry up if I were you. Dear Hatter isn't safe until you are in the castle and in front of the Queen."

As Riza hurried after Kimblee, she glanced at Hatter, who was being dragged along beside her. Their eyes met, and Riza gave him an imperceptible nod, which he returned, sealing a tacit agreement that they would work together to escape.

As they continued down the road, Riza caught a slight movement out of the corner of her eye. Her blood ran cold as she spotted a black cat disappearing into the trees. She sighed. This day was just getting better and better.

A dark figure stood on the balcony of Ouroboros Castle. A smirk played around her lips as she heard a soft meow behind her. Without turning to look at the cat that had just entered, she asked, "So, Envy, I assume you're here to tell me that Kimblee was successful?"

She turned to the homunculus behind her, who had just transformed back into its androgynous teenager form.

"Of course I am!" it said. "I told you he'd be a good pawn."

"Hm." Lust made a noncommittal noise as she turned back to the balcony.

"He's also got Hatter with him," Envy piped up.

Lust spun around.

"I thought I told you to tell Kimblee to kill Hatter," she hissed, irritation slipping into her normally calm tone. Envy glared at the voluptuous woman in front of it.

"It's not my fault Kimblee didn't kill Hatter," it complained. "Apparently he needed Hatter as leverage to get Hawkeye to go with him. Besides, Hatter's only a human. What's he gonna do? Kill us?" Envy laughed at the thought.

"You would do well not to underestimate your opponents so much," Lust told Envy. Envy opened its mouth to make an angry retort, but Lust continued, "You did a good job, though." She glanced down at the tiny figures approaching the castle gates. "They're coming now. While Kimblee brings Lieutenant Hawkeye in, why don't you be a good host and attend to Hatter?"

A sadistic grin crossed Envy's features.

"Yeah," it said. "I think I will. The dungeon seems like appropriate quarters for a traitor."

Lust allowed herself another smile.

"Yes," she said. "Although, I want you to make sure that he does not stay there too long. The moat is a far better place for traitors, I think, and Hatter would make a nice addition to our permanent collection."

Envy's grin widened.

"Of course," it replied. "I'll make sure he's settled in before sunrise."


End file.
